Sky TV Installation
 

Having Sky installed on 13/5 as managed to get 50% off for a year. Sorting this all out for my parents and obviously they're a bit concerned with more cabling and a satellite dish (compared to a single cable from Virgin)

Within reason, will the installer install the dish anywhere of my choosing?
Will the interior cabling be white or black?

Many thanks

Re: Sky TV Installation
 

I moved to SKY about 5 months ago. I was able to chose the exact spot for my dish. The interior cables are all white.

Re: Sky TV Installation
 

Most Sky installers use shotgun cable which means 1 cable per box , once the cable is brought into your property the cable splices into two for both your satellite inputs.

Re: Sky TV Installation
 

Hi Ruddock8, It largely depends on what Sky engineer you get, I wanted a dish on the chimney stack, but was advised that they had to have more than one engineer.

In the end it got put out the front.

The cabling depends on what they have on the van, one word of caution however. If you are having the new HD box, you may have to pay additional money for it, and this is why we sent ours back.

Customer Services told us that it was a free instal but would cost us £70.00 per month, but when it was installed we were told that we would need to pay extra money for additional items - BB, plus BT charge.

If the box installed has a white label on the front of the box, this is where they get you - just be careful.

In the end we stayed with VM

Re: Sky TV Installation
 

Just out of curiosity Arthur have you ever had anything that's gone right ? You've moaned about every firm possible on these boards , you must be the most unluckiest man in the world.

Re: Sky TV Installation
 

I'm confused... You had to pay extra for Sky HD even though the box is free?

I have 2 perfect, out of the way and ground floor accessible spots I'd like the dish to go in. Can the dish be installed on a flexi 2 way arm so it can be tilted? And do trees affect the reception at all? Side of my house would be great and is in line of sight, just have a few of the neighbours trees in the way!

Re: Sky TV Installation
 

Don't worry about dish positioning , when the installer arrives discuss with him where you'd like it and he'll suggest the best place to you and see if that's acceptable with you.

Re: Sky TV Installation
 

ruddock8, What happened was, the engineer called and l asked him if he could place it on the chimney stack, due to low tree's, he said he couldn't, due to health and safety and needed another engineer.

The dish was eventually placed on the corner of the house. We now have Freesat.

However, recently we wanted to get Sky HD, the instal was free and we were told by CS that it could cost us approxc £70.00 per month which was approved.

When the box was installed, we were told to wait 48 hours to get the benefits of HD, BB etc and Sky anytime.

My wife realised that on the HD box there was a white sticker, she had a look and it stated on the sticker ' call this number to get connected to HD and Anytime' we called the number and we were told that we needed a BT box and two routers, that we would have to buy and call BT Openreach to get BB .

This would have cost us extra money. We called Sky and we were told that the engineer should have explained that to us, as we cannot get the service without it.

We were told this would happen over the next 24 hours, but had to pay up front for the service. We went back to Virgin as we felt we were being ripped off by Sky, and l dont like that - thats why l said be careful and get the facts first from Sky.

Re: Sky TV Installation
 

Problem is.. round the back where the box is going to go, there isn't many places it can go. It's fine having it round the front but he's going to have to cable all the way round my house!

Will be interesting to see how the install compares to Virgin - I've had 3 separate installs at my current house and each time the guys have done a superb job with the drilling, cabling and tacking of the wires!

Re: Sky TV Installation
 

The important thing to remember is your the customer , have a chat before he/she starts and tell them your preferred solution , anything your unsure of ask before they start the work and do something your not happy with. I can only speak from my experience at my house however I've had good service on installs from both Sky and VM.

Re: Sky TV Installation
 

When they installed my Sky they threw the cable over the roof, we have had good service from both sky/vm engineers.

BUT, it depends what a day they have had - normally offer tea and biscuits, that normally does the trick.

Re: Sky TV Installation
 

Broadband is not needed for Sky HD, only for On Demand (formerly Anytime+).

How long ago was this? Originally, Anytime+ required a Sky Broadband connection, but this was relaxed a fair while back to allow any broadband connection to be used.

Did you initially sign up for Sky Broadband in addition to Sky HD?

Did you not already have a Virgin broadband connection at the time of the installation?

Re: Sky TV Installation
 

This happened approx three months ago. The Sky engineer did NOT tell us about the extra's. He only told us it takes 48 hours for everything to go on.

It was customer services that told us about BB via Openreach, EVEN though we had BB from VM, we were told we had to have Sky BB as it was a different cable.

We only gave up Sky, due to the information that we needed extra equipment which would cost us more money.

Re: Sky TV Installation
 

You were misinformed :(

Sky On Demand (Anytime+) has been available via *any* ISP for around a year... All you would have had to do was connect your Sky+HD box to your existing Virgin cable broadband router.

Re: Sky TV Installation
 

indeed - I have Sky HD connected to BT broadband for ondemand. Sky do insist on plugging the HD box into a telephone as part of their T&C's and teh engineer is told not to leave it without it plugged in. I might have inadvertantly unplugged the phone line since....;)

Re: Sky TV Installation
 

Just to let you know how the install went...

Had a text from Sky the day before giving me my 2 hour slot. Ian, the engineer, turned up bang on 1pm. Had a look round the garden to see where he could mount the dish, decided best place was on an S pole at the rear of the property. Just so people are aware, they are not like Virgin cables in the sense they use black exterior and then from the wall mounted box they use white... Sky use shotgun (2 cables joined together) coaxial cable that is WHITE all the way from the dish to your box! Also, Sky do not mount terminal wall boxes, the cable goes direct from the dish to your box and is made to look pretty by just using a white stick-on cover.

All in all, the install was very good. Shame the cable is thicker and has numbers printed on it as it doesn't look as good as Virgin on the skirting board but hey ho! Also a shame they don't use terminal boxes as these really do look the business and keep everything flush - but considering I didn't pay for the install or the box - have nothing to complain about really!

Just getting used to the new Sky box - very quick. Different to Virgin in the sense that On Demand is through your internet and then has to be downloaded whereas Virgin is instant. Still.. fantastic overall :)